


Maybe Later

by dev_chieftain



Category: Tiger & Bunny
Genre: Licking, M/M, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-27
Updated: 2011-07-27
Packaged: 2017-10-21 20:16:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/229327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dev_chieftain/pseuds/dev_chieftain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barnaby tries to make his move that drunken night in his apartment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maybe Later

Tiger is asleep.

Barnaby tells himself that, maybe aloud. The world has canted to the side and won't right itself just yet no matter how he tries to straighten his head, which probably means he's a few bottles too deep into his liquor. They've been drinking for hours and. Talking, and he's finally given himself time to think that maybe, maybe this annoying guy who keeps forcing Barnaby to let him help, isn't so bad.

After all, they're meant to be partners, right? Partners. Whatever that means.

Up until lately, he'd thought it pretty much meant 'fuck you, Barnaby, and just suck it up until you finally lure Ouroborus from its lair'. But then, there's that moment, crystallized in his sodden brain. A moment when he'd barely even registered the fire lancing for him.

Tiger, in a split second, saving him. _Because that's what Tiger does._

"...you're," he starts, stops, tastes his mouth, wishes he hadn't. Drunk. He's not just tipsy, he's out and out _drunk._ He tries again. "I hope you're asleep right now," he finally manages, and the words buzz on his lips and ease the dryness pulling at his throat. Too much. He's going to be a little sick in the morning. His thoughts are whirling enough he might not even remember this.

He kind of hopes not.

"I hope you're asleep because I'm _drunk_ ," he mutters numbly, stepping closer. It's strange to have people in his home, stranger still to have Tiger here. It's the ultimate invasion of his personal space. It felt almost-- no. He's not going there. But he remembers the tension that sprang through him at that first contact of knowledge when the screen came to life and his whole damned life was on display, with Tiger right there, looking, snooping like he always does.

Remembers, with embarrassment, how he'd wanted to let out a sigh of relief, how he'd relaxed and been glad it was Tiger and not someone else, when nothing was said about those articles or files until much later, when all other prying eyes and ears were fast asleep and Tiger was, as he is now, half naked and drinking on Barnaby's chair.

That moment of intimacy is why Barnaby is now sitting down in Tiger's lap, careful not to jar his wounded shoulder, careful not to touch too much. He has, for the last several minutes, been carefully settling his weight on the other man, just so and just so. He doesn't want to wake this-- this-- _infuriating person_ up.

Tiger isn't snoring, but he has a defenseless, almost sad expression on his face. He smells faintly of champagne, having eschewed Barnaby's selections of beers and wine coolers; and the sheen of sweat on his chest, his throat, his face, is alluring as nothing else could ever be.

As he edges forward, Barnaby swallows once, bracing his arms on the armrests to either side of Tiger's limp body, pinning him as if he might resist. "I'm drunk," he reasserts, feeling his voice tremble as he wonders at that. Is he really drunk, or is this flipping feeling in his stomach something else? And why is he doing this? Why does he _want to_ do this? "And you're asleep and we're not going to ever talk about this."

That is a promise to himself, more than Tiger, isn't it? He's not even certain why he's talking, except maybe he's trying to talk himself out of this stupid urge.

His heart is pounding.

He leans forward, holding his breath, and kisses Tiger's damnable mouth. Maybe he gasps a bit when he realizes how soft and sweet those lips are, that he has been trying to ignore all this time. Just a hint of the fruity tang of champagne, and Tiger stirs and the world stops.

They stare at each other. Tiger's eyes are wide awake and completely sober.

He says, very softly, with Barnaby's mouth still on his, "If you wanted the chair that bad, Bunny-chan, you could've just said so."

That's it: he tries to sit up, to push Barnaby off, and Barnaby lets him sit, feeling the heat in his face, the off-kilter whirling of the world that means he's drunk. Fuck. _Fuck_.

Before he can think about it, he leans down instead of sliding aside to let Tiger pass, letting his tongue do the thinking (or maybe some other-- muscle), tracing the line of sweat from Tiger's jaw along his jugular, down across the planes of his chest to the right nipple, which he can feel through the bandages and flicks with his tongue, not thinking for a moment that Tiger will let him get away with it.

But he does. He just freezes there, breath hitching, and says nothing, and when Barnaby looks up there's that sad expression again, almost lonely. Tiger stares down, and when Barnaby tentatively bites his nipple he bites down on his _whimper_ , which is all Barnaby really wanted.

To hear Tiger make a sound like that. To see- what, he doesn't know. He can feel the quickness of Tiger's pulse, see the nervousness in those damnably intense, honest eyes. Almost amber, those eyes. This time, when Tiger tries to move away, Barnaby really does let him, and he goes to the restroom without a word.

Barnaby thinks that's it, that's the end of it; he flops down on the floor, hand over his eyes, and curses himself, his stupidity. Of course, it _would_ be on the day that he finds out this man had a wife and _has_ a daughter that he decides to act on what had previously been no more than speculation. Now he's not even sure. Is it a crush? Is it worse?

 _Well, licking your partner's throat and trying to accost him while he's sleeping definitely doesn't qualify as 'better', anyway,_ he thinks with an annoyed groan, grinding the heel of his palm into his brow as if that might help him escape the shame welling in his throat.

A wet rag strikes face, and he sits up with a snarl that fades, when he sees Tiger's weary expression and remembers that Tiger isn't the one who did something stupid. _This_ time.

"I probably won't remember that in the morning," Tiger admits, with a ghost of his usual cheer, sitting down on the floor with his legs crossed. "It would just make you uncomfortable, after all, and right after we finally came to some kind of accord. I'd hate to have to start over."

Barnaby plucks the wet rag off of his nose, wiping his face with it and tossing it to the floor carelessly. It's already strewn with bottles. "--I'm sorry." After careful thought, he's sure there's nothing else he can say that wouldn't be accusatory (foolishly trying to shift the blame he feels) or guilty (embarrassing).

With a shrug, Tiger lays back, wincing a bit as it pulls on the burn beneath his bandages. "Nothing to be sorry for. You're drunk, as you said. Who's to say I'm not asleep?"

Barnaby has, for an embarrassing moment, desperate visions of ravaging that delicious body with his tongue alone, drinking up the sweat and the sound of Tiger's voice in a keening, hungry moan. He feels himself go pale, and groans again, throwing an arm over his eyes. "This isn't going to just go away."

"I know." He can feel Tiger's smile from here. "But try again some other time. Maybe sometime when we're not drunk." And then that damned laugh, layers of sorrow and old hurt and forced cheer and then, on top of it all, genuine amusement. Damn him. _Damn him._ "I don't think we'd forgive ourselves now."

 _Try again some other time._

Needless to say, the following hours spent trying to sink into a drunken stupor and sleep are plagued all the more by his lurid, obscene _absolutely unacceptable_ fantasies for those words. He curses Tiger silently, and bites his lip, and grits his teeth.

And when the morning comes with an insistent repetitive ring of his doorbell, in a flush of shame as he remembers _everything_ , he is pathetically grateful for the kindness this man has shown, keeps showing him. He mournfully retrieves his glasses, and sighs.

"How careless of me."


End file.
